


someone else's problem

by Twice_before_Friday



Series: Altered & Extended - season 2 [5]
Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Burns, Episode: s02e05 Bad Manners, Explosions, Fire, Gen, Hurt Malcolm Bright, Major Character Injury, Stand Alone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 19:41:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29441343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Twice_before_Friday/pseuds/Twice_before_Friday
Summary: Ainsley yanks the front door open and manages to get a few steps out onto the portico, but Malcolm is only just clearing the doorway when his world goes white.The explosion is deafening.
Relationships: Malcolm Bright & Ainsley Whitly
Series: Altered & Extended - season 2 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2112852
Comments: 20
Kudos: 97





	someone else's problem

**Author's Note:**

> So I realize I've tried to blow this boy up like, four times now? I hope it's not getting old ❤

"I smell gas." Malcolm pauses, focusing on the scent that's wafting into the room. He wasn't entirely sure, not at first, but now there's not a doubt in his mind. He'd noticed the gas lamps lining the walls of every room when he came to question Miss Windsor earlier in the day. And since gas lamps equal gas lines, a leak in the building means the old Manor has become a potential tinderbox 

"What?" Ainsley asks. He's not sure if the question is rhetorical or if she didn't actually hear him, if her ears are still ringing from the close quarters gunshot that nearly killed her.

"We need to get out of here. Now." 

He bends down and tugs Rachel up into a fireman's carry, tossing her over his shoulders as quickly as he can manage, taking only a second or two to get his balance and find his center of gravity.

"Come on. Come on!" Ainsley shouts, ushering him along as she hurries to the door. It may have taken a close call with a serial killer and the possibility of being blown up by a gas leak, but Ainsley finally seems to understand the gravity of the situation she's thrown herself into. Her words are tinged with a sense of urgency she's yet to show in the course of their investigations.

Even still, he casts her a worried glance as she pauses in the hall, spinning back to check his progress as they make a break for the exit. He doesn't want to, but he can't help but search for that gleam in her eye, that terrifying flicker that he's caught sight of in their father's gaze a handful of times throughout the years.

Most memorably, when he was pinning Eddie to the ground and gouging his eyes out, all while grinning up at Malcolm through the locked door of his cell.

He's terrified of finding that same mania in his sister's eyes.

So afraid, in fact, that he unintentionally risked both of their lives trying to prevent Ainsley from stabbing their suspect. Sure, he did his best to make it sound like he was talking to Rachel, like he was trying to keep her from shooting him, but his words were for Ainsley and Ainsley alone. He _needed_ her to stop. Because sneaking up behind Rachel like that, with a knife in hand and a cold glint in her eye, was far too reminiscent of how she'd crept up on Nicholas Endicott. A flash of memories had assaulted his mind as he watched her inch closer to Rachel, his heart plummeting as the visions suddenly transformed into Ainsley slitting Rachel's throat instead of Endicott's, stabbing her over and over and over again with an unbridled and incurable rage.

Calling out for Ainsley to stop, though, very nearly got her killed, and that's on him. But as he rushes through the halls — relieved beyond measure to find no trace of The Surgeon lurking behind Ainsley's worried gaze — he packs that away for later self-recrimination.

Right now, they need to run.

The smell of gas grows stronger with every step they take, becoming cloying, stifling, as they rush down the narrow stairwell and through labyrinthine halls. They skirt past a room at the front of the manor, slowing enough to catch sight of Miss Windsor standing by the window as she reaches for a small box, but the pungent scent makes his stomach churn and his vision blur. He debates, just for a moment, trying to talk the woman down — even from where he stands, the defeat is clearly etched in every aspect of her carriage and deportment, leaving him little doubt as to what she's about to do — but he also knows they need to move quickly if they're going to make it out of the house on time. Ainsley could certainly get clear without him, but Rachel's life is quite literally in his hands. He makes his decision and hurries away, but the burden of Rachel's dead weight over his shoulders slows them down far more than he'd like.

"Ains, you need to run. Get out of here." The words are strained, his body struggling to carry the extra weight, his mind struggling to comprehend what could've happened in that bedroom. He can't stop wondering how things would've played out if he hadn't shown up when he did. Ainsley was laying there, waiting to make her move when he walked into the room. Was her plan to merely defend herself as soon as Rachel got close enough? Or was she planning to kill Rachel all along? 

The questions circle in his mind, but no matter what she's done, no matter what darkness might be lurking inside of her, she's still his sister. And he _needs_ her to be safe.

"I'm not leaving you," she whisper-shouts, grabbing hold of his arm and tugging him left when he angles right at the end of a hallway. He doesn't remember passing that way in his search for her, but at his confused look, she simply rolls her eyes and says, "It's a shortcut." 

He follows her blindly, trusting that Ainsley knows the ins and outs of the historic building almost as well as their childhood home. She'd spent enough time here, years ago, that the school was truly a second home for her for a period of time.

After everything he saw back then — the appalling pressure she was under as a debutante — and everything he's learned during the course of their investigation, he's starting to wonder which of her homes was more traumatizing.

Ainsley's whisper interrupts his musing as they rush towards the door, "What was she doing?"

"Nothing good," Malcolm pants, becoming lightheaded as gas fills the manor. Thankfully, as she leads them through a lavishly decorated study, the front door suddenly comes into sight.

The call of fresh air, of safety, is overpowering and they pick up the pace, sprinting the final steps to make it to the security of the outdoors.

Ainsley yanks the front door open and manages to get a few steps out onto the portico, but Malcolm is only just clearing the doorway when his world goes white.

The explosion is deafening.

And searing.

The force of the blast sends him flying, losing his grip on Rachel's body as they're hurled through the air towards the serenity of the open air that had seemed so safe a moment ago. He has the span of maybe a dozen wildly pumping heartbeats to register the scorching heat that descends on him hard and fast and unrelenting before the blinding white turns to a pure and utter blackness that swallows him whole as his head cracks against the driveway.

The world filters back in slowly. Or quickly. He's not entirely sure. 

He becomes aware of a profound ache throughout his body before anything else. An intense throbbing that wraps around every bone, every limb, like a wet blanket, heavy and suffocating and weighing him down, resolutely pressing him into the asphalt beneath him.

That dull ache quickly gives way to blistering pain, though, followed almost immediately by the acrid smell of burning fabric, burning flesh. 

His body reacts before his mind has a chance to catch up. He rolls from his stomach onto his back, an agonized scream ripping from his lungs as the heat gets infinitely worse before it starts to ease as he rolls on the ground, smothering the flames that he can feel eating through his jacket and shirt, licking at the skin of his upper back.

When the worst of the heat seems to have died away, he fights to pull his jacket off, to get the smoldering fabric as far away from his skin as possible. His movements are awkward, his body protesting the sudden motion, but he manages to rip off the jacket with a ragged scream as it tears some of his skin along with it.

And the night air, blessedly cool, is a welcome sting following the searing burn. He allows his body to collapse, sprawled out on his stomach once again, permitting himself a moment's rest before he works on figuring out what the hell just happened. 

His head is just so foggy.

He gasps in heaving lungfuls of oxygen, trying to clear his mind, but the air tastes bitter and tainted. 

Smoke.

Ash.

It takes a moment longer for his mind to catch up. To remember where he is. The Windsor School of Etiquette. The killer — Rachel; Miss Windsor's daughter, hidden away and never loved like her mother's star pupils.

And then, Ainsley.

Malcolm's eyes shoot open, his head jerking up so quickly that the asphalt scrapes against the side of his face, dragging along his cheek and jaw. His gaze lands on Rachel first, several feet away and still unconscious. The slow rise and fall of her back confirms she's still breathing, still alive, and Malcolm continues to search for his sister.

He finds her, kneeling in the grass, sitting on her feet like she did when she was just a little girl as she stares up at the burning building. Her hands lay limp in her lap, her posture hunched in a way she'd never usually permit of herself, especially not here. But the vacant look in her eyes suggests that she's not entirely _herself_ right now, anyways.

"Ainsley!" Malcolm shouts. He hears the word bounce around inside his head, but it's only as it falls from his lips and becomes muffled and indistinct in his ears that he realizes he can't actually hear much of anything at all. His sense of hearing is consumed by a high pitched ringing that feels like thousands of pinpricks to his eardrums, and the deafening tone does nothing to help the raging headache that's threatening to make his stomach rebel.

He pushes up to his hands and knees, hissing as the remains of his shirt pull over his back, tugging on the burns he's sure are beginning to blister and weep across his skin. The world tilts at the sudden movement and he finds himself listing to the right, struggling to catch his balance before he winds up flat on the ground once again.

He cycles a few deep breaths through his lungs, letting the oxygen — smoky as it is — clear his head until the world rights itself. 

Then he starts to crawl.

His entire body aches with each movement he makes, battered and bruised from the shockwave of the explosion, but still he presses on. He keeps his eyes trained on Ainsley as he moves, watching her for any sign of injury, any sign of recognition in her gaze, but she seems completely dazed, entirely unaware of her surroundings.

"Ains," he pants as he crawls up beside her, pushing himself up enough to mimic her pose as he reaches out a hand, gently cupping her face to pull her gaze from the blazing inferno of her old etiquette school until she's looking him in the eye, blinking sluggishly.

She doesn't seem to recognize him, at first. Her gaze slides slowly over his face, like her eyes can't quite lock onto his features. In the glow of the flames, he can see the goose-egg forming on her temple, right where Rachel hit her with the gun, and Malcolm wonders if her state of confusion is from the blast or from being pistol-whipped.

"Ains, talk to me." He's not sure if he's yelling, not sure if she'll be able to hear him even if he is, but he needs her to respond. Needs to know she's safe. "Ainsley!"

It's like watching the fog dissipate on a fall morning as a clarity slowly dawns over her features, her eyes finally latching on to him. "Malcolm?"

His name still comes to him muffled, but the fact that he hears it at all is cause for celebration. Even the crackle of the fire is starting to register as it roars and pops and consumes the house and everything inside. He makes a conscious effort to lower his voice as he says, "Yeah, it's me. Are you okay?"

Her eyes flicker to the spreading inferno for a moment, then trail back to Malcolm. "Did she do that? Why would she do that?"

There's an innocence etched on Ainsley's face that nearly makes Malcolm cry. The last few months, he's been watching her so damn closely for signs of psychopathy, for indications of their father's hold on them bleeding through her polished exterior. Seeing her now, like this, reminds him of when they were children, when Ainsley was wide eyed with wonder about every adventure they pursued. Reminds him that, despite what happened with Endicott, that little girl is still in there somewhere.

"I don't know," he huffs. He has his suspicions, of course, and knows further investigation will likely lend credence to his theories, but Ainsley doesn't need to hear any of it just yet.

Though he suspects she'll be angling for an official quote by sunrise.

Right now, he follows her gaze back to the manor and the two of them remain there, kneeling on the front lawn as the building burns around them. He suspects he should be doing _something_ but he's so goddamn tired and he _hurts_ and he's honestly just so relieved that Ainsley is okay that he closes his eyes against the blaze, watching the play of light from behind his eyelids and letting the warmth of the fire settle over him.

He's vaguely aware of the roar of an engine as it splits the night, but it's not until Gil's voice follows soon after that he bothers to drag his eyelids open.

He's surprised to find the world sideways. Even more surprised to find his head cradled in Ainsley's lap.

"Bright! Ainsley!" Gil calls as he skids to a stop in front of them, dropping down to his knees and reaching out, only to be stopped short of wrapping a hand over Malcolm's shoulder by Ainsley's trembling fingers. 

"He's been burnt. His back," Ainsley says quietly. He hadn't noticed before now, but her other hand is softly carding through his hair. 

It's nice.

"What the hell happened?" JT's voice draws his attention away from the fear that's painted on Gil's face, finding the taciturn detective bent over Rachel, feeling for a pulse.

"Miss Windsor, I think," Malcolm murmurs. 

Gil's hand lands warm on his face, comfort seeping into him at the familiar touch. Gil doesn't even pull back when JT crouches down beside them, eyeing Ainsley and Malcolm with concern as he says, "The girl seems okay, just unconscious. Bus is on it's way and should be here in five."

Malcolm suspects that the ambulance might be for him, and he's not terribly pleased about it, but his back feels raw and his head hurts and he knows from experience that paramedics carry some pretty damn good pain killers and he wouldn't object to some of those right about now. 

JT carefully shifts on the ground, kneeling over Malcolm to get a good look at his back. "Hey man, I know it probably hurts like a mother fucker, but it's not too bad. I've seen guys with a lot worse make a full recovery. You're gonna be fine."

Malcolm thinks he hears three very relieved sighs, and he thinks one of them might have even come from him, but everything is starting to go dim again as the adrenaline begins to fade and the pain and exhaustion take over.

He means to tell them that Rachel is their killer, that Miss Windsor likely set the fire intentionally as her world slowly crumbled around her, and to remind them that he doesn't want any sedatives. But Gil's hand on his cheek and the rhythmic pull of Ainsley's fingers through his hair as she watches the blaze, the fire dancing in her eyes, leaves his eyelids flickering closed before he can voice any of it.

It's okay, though, he thinks, because Ainsley is safe and she can fill the team in on what happened leading up to the explosion.

He spares a moment to wonder if she'll tell Gil or the camera first, but then he drifts off, allowing it, just for once, to be someone else's problem.


End file.
